In Senate Hearing, Rosen Condemns Trump State Department Nominee for Antisemitic Remarks

Watch the full exchange HERE.

WASHINGTON, DC - During a Senate Foreign Relations Committee hearing, U.S. Senator Jacky Rosen (D-NV), co-founder and co-chair of the Senate Bipartisan Task Force for Combating Antisemitism, condemned nominee Jeremy Carl for his long history of antisemitic and racist comments and implored her Republican colleagues to reject his nomination to serve as Assistant Secretary of State for International Organization Affairs.

Below is a transcript of Senator Rosen's remarks as delivered:

Senator Rosen: I, too, today want to speak plainly about the troubling nomination of Mr. Jeremy Carl. It is not a close call. This nomination should alarm every senator who believes in basic decency, truth and responsibility that does come with public service.

Mr. Carl is infamous for deleting thousands of his past tweets, but deleting tweets does not delete the many recorded podcast interviews, public speeches, or editorials he has done. As many of my colleagues have and will point out, Mr. Carl's vile antisemitic comments are very real, whether he tried to erase them or excuse them.

As co-founder and co-chair of the Senate Bipartisan Task Force for Combating Antisemitism, the only former synagogue president to serve in the United States Senate, and as a Jewish woman and mother, I am especially compelled to call out Mr. Carl's record.

I'm just going to put it in context. In a study released this week by the American Jewish Committee, one in three Jewish Americans stated they have personally experienced antisemitism at least once in the last year.

In the last year, another study found that one in five Jewish Americans were assaulted, physically threatened, or harassed right here in the United States. Our own citizens, all of our constituents, everyone, nobody feels safe in their home, their own communities. I think this is something that senators on both sides of the aisle really care about. I do know that.

Yet Mr. Carl, despite his long record of problematic statements, has been nominated to lead our country's engagement with every single country in the world through our diplomatic work with international organizations.

Some may try to excuse Mr. Carl's remarks, claiming his words were taken out of context and he never said that, or that his own heritage protects him from criticism. Let me be clear: identity does not excuse antisemitism. Identity does not excuse racism. Identity does not excuse hateful rhetoric, regardless of who says them.

Words matter, as my colleagues have said. Words matter. Character matters. Judgment matters. To my colleagues that may consider voting in favor of Mr. Carl's nomination, understand what the vote signals. It tells Americans you are willing to use your sacred vote, not just to ignore but to endorse the hateful statements that tell Jewish Americans they simply don't matter.

I ask everyone in this room - depending what your age is - many of us here have had relatives, parents, who fought in World War II. We know those stories. Thank you for your service - I see a Vietnam veteran in the audience. But imagine them young. Or maybe not so young, sitting here today, in their uniform. It's hard to imagine maybe our parents young, but imagine them young or coming back sitting here today, looking at us, knowing what they fought for. They are watching us. Whether they are there or here.

Mr. Carl, I would be hard-pressed to find any person in this room, not any of my colleagues who would agree with your statements. I want to quote some of them.

"The Jews love to see themselves as oppressed."

"Jews have often loved to play the victim, rather than accept they're participants in history."

Another one, "Hitler is always the convenient kind of bad example."

Hitler is "always a convenient kind of bad example." Anyone who had family members who served in World War II, I would have them - I wish they were here to argue with you on that one.

"I'm very critical on," another thing you said, "on the political stance and sociology of the Jewish community, it has been very destructive overall."

Another quote, "You guys are spearheading a lot of bad causes."

Another quote, "We need to criticize and critique them" referring to the Jews when they are enemies, "without being worried about being called antisemites."

In discussing the Holocaust, where six million Jews, almost half the population alive at the time, were slaughtered, an event that continues to be denied to this day, you say, "The Holocaust dominates so much of modern Jewish thinking, even today. Everyone has traumas in their past. How much are we going to relitigate them?"

Say that to the memories of the folks who fought in World War II. Fought and died.

Speaking to my colleagues, a vote in favor of Mr. Carl is a vote - a full throated endorsement of any and all of these statements. I know everyone cares about the rise of antisemitism here and around the United States and around the world. If you have empathy for the Jewish community, communities experiencing hate, simply tired of advancing nominees who I doubt will be respected on the world stage, you must vote against Mr. Carl's nomination.

I just remember from my father who fought in the war and so many of my family members, I know he is watching, I know other parents are watching, I know our children are watching, I know the world is watching.

So, where will we stand? Where will we stand? What did they fight for? That matters.

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